23 May 2011, 15:52
Vincent
Guest
Oops A Whole New Level of Scam from Cameroon
A brilliant bit of scamming a whole order of magnitude better than anything seen in these pages before - I say as the potential scamee that lost no money, but did lose about 3 days working up this proposal and related activities.
The short story is that they used our website to send us an inquiry for 3,000 industrial size rubbish bins that they had decided they wanted to officially pay 1500 euros each, but only hand over 1100 to us, keeping the rest for themselves - and it appeared they had done this often in the past and this was how business was done in Cameroon. The fellow rang me, a real smoothie, excellent English speaking and quite comfortable with the corrupt business deal he was proposing. Well these bins cost about 700 euros landed so I said 1000 will be fine by us, after all I didn't know how many others had been sent the inquiry and it was still a pretty good profit! I was getting ready to fly to Cameroon where of course I would have been told about the fees I needed to pay, but fortunately the due diligence piece lead me here, thank you for putting this website together.
For those that want to muse over the details, or Google key phrases and turn up here, this is all the gory detail in chronological order, minus attachments and id info for me:
From: Hon.Simon Achidi Achu
hon_achidiachu@live.com Sent: Wednesday, 11 May, 2011 2:18 AM
To:
Subject: Contract Supply
Attn; Sir/ Madam,
I am Honorable Simon Achidi Achu, the Vice Chairman of the CPDM Party (Cameroon People's Democratic Movement) which is the ruling Party in Cameroon. And the Chairman of the contract Award Committee of this contract supply of Hoppers for the CPDM Party of Cameroon. I got your contact from search engine and I learn that your company is into the production/supply of Hoppers.
The reason why I contacted you in this business is because I want us to work together in this business for mutual benefit.
Firstly I would like to know if your company can handle a contract supply of Hoppers for the CPDM Party(Government) of Cameroon.
- The volume of this supply is 5.000.000.00 Euros( Five Million Euros) supplied to the Douala Port of Cameroon.
- And the duration of the supply is 11 months from the date the contract is signed.
- The terms of payment is 100% immediately the contract is signed.
Due to the volume of this contract, I would like to hear directly from your director in order to enable us to quickly finalize this arrangement.
Get back to me in time.
Regards
Honorable Simon Achidi Achu
Chairman- Contract Award Committee
CPDM Party House - Congress Hall Bamenda
P.o Box 4008 Bamenda
Direct Line :
00237 78 90 89 67Email :
hon_achidiachu@live.com____________________________________________________________ __________
From me, I am pretty casual about the enquiry, initial checks had found this enquiry could be real, but not certain as I couldn't find the guy / office in their phone book (
http://cameroonphonebook.com/en/community/), but there were similar numbers listed which was a positive sign, but not sufficiently conclusive:
We certainly can supply hoppers in the requested timeframe. Please provide more details of your requirements, particularly details of size required and application of use. Thank you.
____________________________________________________________ __________
From: Hon.Simon Achidi Achu
hon_achidiachu@live.com Sent: Wednesday, 18 May, 2011 1:09 AM
To:
Subject: RE: Contract Supply - Hoppers
Attn Mr. me,
I would like to start by thanking you for your email.
I want you to understand that my main reason for contacting your company in this business is because I want us to work together in this business for mutual benefit. As the chairman of the award committee of this contract, I have all the powers of awarding this contract to any company I find eligible provided the company agrees to work with me in this contract on bases of my commission as I want to make a personal profit out of this whole business.
Below are the dimensions of the hoppers. But we can still consider some thin g similar provided it is of the same quality and has a good price as this is an open tender.b This hoppers are to be used for refuse dumping.
Dimensions
Height/in.: 41
Width/in.: 49
Depth/in.: 51-1/4
Capacity/lb.: 2000
Fork Ctrs./in.: 21-3/4
Cap/cu. yds.: 1-1/2
In order to break down details, like I said, the Party has budget the sum of Five million Euros to fund this entire contract and following our analysis, we the committee have decided that we are going to buy 3.000 pieces of these Hoppers at the price of 1.500 Euros each supplied to the Douala Port of Cameroon. So I want to know if your company can supply us with these Hoppers as per the above dimensions or some thing similar at the price of 1.100 Euros per hopper supplied to the Douala Port of Cameroon and while supplying, your invoice would be issued for 1.500 Euros according to the committee’s estimate and after the contract, you return to me 400.euros the over invoice money as my commission. Then I will take care of my committee members.
Also there are certain conditions which the Party has set aside that every company interested in participating in this contract and every Party contract has to fulfil in order to be qualified for participation in the contract and these conditions are to protect both the party’s interest and the company’s interest as well.
1. The company has to be registered in Cameroon under the OHADA Uniform Act as a government/Party supplier in order to be qualified for participation in the bidding process of this contract. And the registration has to be backdated to show that the company has been registered at least one year ago.
2. The company has to provide a bank attestation obtained from a first class Cameroon financial institution and the declaration should not be less than 30% of the contract value in order to prove the company's capability of handling such contracts.
3. Payment terms: The terms of payment are 100% advance payment upon official signing and sealing of the contract. The payment would be made through wire transfer based on :-
i) If the company attaches to her bid the bank attestation worth 30% of the contract value; the Party will pay 100% worth the contract value up front immediately the contract is signed.
ii) If the company did not attach to her bid the bank attestation as specified in conditions (2) above, then the company would supply before receiving any payment.
These conditions are as a result of the dubious behaviours of some companies in time past, as many companies have abused the Party confidence in them, as they receive advance payment on a contract and abandoned the contract; while others do not supply according to the quality agreed. The Party has decided that any company to be awarded a Party contract must work according to the above mentioned terms to enable us manage the risk. Either to present a bank attestation to prove their financial backing or to supply before any payment should be made.
I want you to understand that before contacting your company in this business, I had already mapped out a perfect strategy on how I want to handle this with the company that agrees to work with me on bases of my commission. Regarding the above conditions, you don't need to border about the payment condition because I am personally going to assist you on that.
- In order to present the bank attestation; all what you have to do is to open a bank account in Cameroon and I would provide you money worth 30% of the contract value to put into the account and the bank issue you the bank attestation which you would attach to your bid when bidding for the contract. Then after the contract has been awarded to your company, you withdraw back my money. But if you consider the bank attestation process as a long process, I am equally ready to assist you provide you with 100% funds to handle the entire contract and then you refund back my money along side my commission at the done of the contract when you receive payment from the government.
Let me know if there is any thing you did not understand.
Get back to me in time
Regards,
Honorable Simon Achidi Achu
Chairman- Contract Award Committee
CPDM Party House - Congress Hall Bamenda
P.o Box 4008 Bamenda
Direct Line :
00237 78 90 89 67Email :
hon_achidiachu@live.com____________________________________________________________ __________
Oh, OK – I get it, and a bit of Googling shows this could easily be typical of how business is done in these parts, so I come back with:
Yes, I do believe we can do this business, exactly in accordance with the terms and requirements you have explained. And thank you for your complete and candid explanation of the opportunity to do the business. I am still awaiting confirmation of transport details but expect very soon to provide a formal offer to supply these hoppers and am sure you will be very happy with the product supplied if we are successful.
I then went on for a couple of pages with a bunch of details and a couple of q’s. and then sent another email the next day that started like this, I got a bit carried away ensuring we won the sucker (sic!):
I have good news, very good news! We have done further investigation with regard to manufacturing details and can confirm we can improve the product offered, reduce the delivery time AND reduce the actual price paid by you. I have attached our formal “official” offer for your consideration, but I can advise that your profit will now increase to 500 Euros each hopper. So that is an extra 300 thousand Euros of profit for you if our company is awarded this contract.
Of course more details went with that...!
____________________________________________________________ __________
From: Hon.Simon Achidi Achu
hon_achidiachu@live.comSent: Saturday, 21 May, 2011 2:00 AM
To:
Subject: RE: Contract Supply - Hoppers - Good News
Attn; Mr. First name,
We had bad lines on phone and could barely discuss. I guess it is due to the poor whether condition here as it was raining. I wanted to speak with your on phone so that I can get to know you better and better know my partner. I am sure next time we would have a better network for communication.
Thank you very much for your attention and efforts in putting together things necessary for the realization of this business operation between us. I am very impressed with this and want to assure you that this contract is completely secured as we work together in this contract for mutual benefit.
Like I said in my last email, before contacting your company in this business, I had already mapped out a perfect strategy on how to handle this business with the company that agrees to work with me on bases of my commission. The most important thing was to ensure that I gain the full support of my committee member which I already did. You know as the chairman of this contract, having all the powers over this contract does not mean that my other committee members are not equally important. So I have to start by securing their full support of awarding this contract to the company I bring forth. So you have nothing to border about as we agree to work together in this contract and my interest secured
To tell you am happy here is an under statement. I am more than happy with the analysis you have come out with in this whole business especially regarding the price arrangement and my commission increase. Now I understand that you would be supplying the goods for us at the price of 1.000 Euros (best known only between the two of us) but while supplying, your invoice would be issued for 1.500 Euros according to the committee’s estimate and after the transaction, you return to me 500 Euros the over invoice money as my commission. In this case, just consider my part of this deal done.
As I said, the Party has budget the sum of 5.Million Euros for this entire contract. But the committee decided to place the contract on 4.5million Euros while still deliberating on where to place the remaining 500.000euros in the contract. So your supply would be for the budget of 4.5Million Euros for now except we decide to round it up to the 5.million Euros.
Haven gotten this analysis, I want to draw your attention to the fact that there is much pressure mounted on my committee from the party for us to quickly release the tenders for this contract so that the contract award can be done as soon as possible and the contract production commences so that we can use the contract as one of our prominent campaign strategies for the up coming presidential elections in October this year. So I will be having a crucial meeting with my committee members early next week to confirm your offer and am confident they would be very delighted with it. After that we would conclude on the release of the tenders for the contract and I will let you know about the dating.
Regarding the conditions set aside for this contract: - As for getting your company registered in Cameroon under the OHADA Uniform Act and getting the registration backdated, this is not a difficult thing to handle. I would have done this my self but due to I don’t want any body to know that I have any thing directly or indirectly to do with your company in order to avoid any thing that can sabotage my office or any thing that can bring about a protest when this contract has already been awarded to your company. So in order to get the company registered, all you need to do is to come down here and handle it personally but if you cannot come down here immediately, then you have to hire a local attorney here to handle that for you while you make arrangements for coming down later when the company is registered so that we arrange for the bank attestation for the contract.
As for the bank attestation, what you would need to do is that when the company is registered, you would use the registration documents in order to get a bank account opened for the registered company with any Cameroon first class bank, then I will provide you with the 30% (1.5million Euros) to put into the bank account and the bank issue you with the bank attestation which you would attach to your bid when bidding for the contract. Then after the contract, you withdraw back my money.
Like I said, I will be having a crucial meeting with my committee members early next week in order for us to decide on the dates for the release of the tenders of the contract which would probably be early next month. And when the tenders are released, you have to immediately submit your bid for us to treat it immediately and proceed with the official award of the contract. This means that the company registration and attestation arrangements have to be done as soon as possible before the release of the tenders for the contract so that by the time the tenders are being released, every thing is ready for you to submit your bid offer.
Get back to me in time let me know your schedule and possibilities of coming down here within the shortest possible time you are able so that we decide on how to move forward with this arrangements.
Regards
Honorable
(he must have been excited, he forgot to stick his not-so-honourable name in! When he rung it was from the number he lists.)
____________________________________________________________ __________
I finished with this and, two days later there is no reply, nor I suspect will there ever be, I just include it for the fraudwatchers plug, which I picked as the most similar prior scam listed hoping it was one of this guy's and rub his nose in it a bit for what the world thought of this ****ty behaviour!:
Subject: RE: Contract Supply - Hoppers - An Important Problem
Dear Mr Achidi Achu,
I have been doing many things to ensure that this order for hoppers goes well as I like to put the planning effort in up front for major projects and ensure the supply happens with no problems. I was considering coming to Cameroon for the week from 30 May but have found an important problem.
As you would appreciate, one of the things I need to do as a director is to perform a due diligence, ie make sure that the project we are about to put resources into is credible. Unfortunately many of your countrymen have been offering large tenders, with a requirement to pay commissions to the chairman of the award committee, that have the ultimate purpose to have the contracting company (like ourselves) become registered, thus paying one or more fees, and no contract is ever entered into. I am also having trouble confirming your position and identity, and your appointment to act with the authority you say you do.
These discoveries are a disappointment to me, I was looking forward to this project and now I doubt it will happen. Here is an example of the problem
http://www.fraudwatchers.org/forums/...&postcount=107 , there are many more! Of course, whilst I am not making any allegation here, I am disappointed by this discovery that this sort of attempt to steal from others is happening so much in your fine country.
If of course things are as you say you can easily put this situation right (ie. the misdeeds of others), and restore my trust. With your certainty that this order will proceed, and your personal wealth that is able to “provide you with 100% funds to handle the entire contract”, you will have no problems advancing me five thousand Euros to cover the cost of a trip to Cameroon, plus pay any administrative fees that may be involved whilst I establish eligibility. Of course, once the contract proceeds, I will refund any advances to get the outcome to be the increased commission as agreed in our most recent communication. Let me know.
#265
Old 23 May 2011, 17:07
Dodobird
Support
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: La la land
Timezone: GMT
Languages: English Français Español
Hello Vincent and welcome to Fraudwatchers!
That is a good example of how these tenders/scams work. A couple of things to add to your already extensive research;
- the telephone provided,
00237 78 90 89 67, is that of a mobile number and can easily be verified as such
here- the "yahoo" version of this email address was identified as scam last October on this site
__________________
#266
Old 26 May 2011, 23:25
Vincent
Join Date: May 2011
Location: NSW, Australia
Timezone: GMT +10
Languages: English
The Quality of this Cameroon Government Scam was ExceptionalI am in my 50's, and not a complete fool - or so I thought, but I have escaped this scam by the skin of my teeth, only having lost a bunch of time and sleep working on the details until way too late at night, but no actual money. I have however realised that there may be a lot of genuine business opportunities in the region and am inclined to look for them with a view to doing the deed in the foreseeable future as I am pretty confident we could offer good value solutions, separate story!
So who is this potential scamee, would you get sucked in like I nearly did? I am methodical, analytical, and work both the details and "the big end" of whatever I am engaged in to ensure it becomes an answer that works for all involved. I like to take solid steps in any business dealing, checking that it is real and ensuring that all parties are likely to be able to manage their components. Plus I thought I knew people, after all it is people that do everything in this world - all that changes is the mechanisms to bring their contributions to the particular endeavour to hand.
Well boy have I learnt something in this scam. I guess that scamming, as opposed to a bit of self interest dishonesty, is a skill-set I have not been exposed to before - and this operation was really smooth, highly credible and frankly to be marvelled at for the brilliance of its execution. Or I am a way bigger fool than I ever thought I was. Or a bit of both, suffice to say I sure have learnt something here. And I am really thankful for the specific support provided me by two members of this site, and the contributions of others here of course with their information, as I was on the verge of getting in deeper but for their kind and diligent assistance.
I guess the only “other” thing that saved me is that I have enormous reserves of internal energy and can keep going well past when most take the "that'll do" option, what I call this is "the ability to really sort out what is an answer and what isn't, and the energy then to make it an absolute beauty". Plus I do "OK" when I get IQ tests waved at me, which is a handy attribute but chastened by the knowledge that there are all kinds of “intelligence” within the human psyche, and I only have some of them in helpful quantities! I say these things, not to brag or preserve some level of self esteem or dignity for my near blunder, but as an insight to the kind of person that scammers have honed their skills to the point that can rope us in. I nearly stuffed up here and am quite OK with taking full responsibility for that, but it sure feels nice to have escaped while the stakes were low!
I will shortly post all the gory details of my correspondence, plus I intend to come back to this and add some more commentary and info as I haven't quite played the thing out to where I want it, now that I KNOW it is a scam. What I want is for key phrases of this corro to turn up on Google for the benefit of others, and I am pleased that already my first post comes near the top for relevant phrases so that is a big endorsement for how Google has viewed the benefits the fraudwatchers site brings to the planet, well done Fraud Busters one and all!!! Then hopefully my commentary / self-evident nature of the business will allow people to make better choices in dealing with this stuff.
The only thing I am disappointed about is that I have had to lose the opportunity to have the scammer intercepted by the police. This basically happened because the Canadian Trade Commissioner said they would help me in checking the credentials but then didn't. I am not sure what happened there as I'm pretty sure I heard the words out of the guy's mouth, but then it was as if he didn't say them. Beats me, but it meant I had to give up getting an intercept done on my supposed arrival at the airport as I had to give the scammer a shove and see if he wobbled, he panicked and bolted!
The one thing I had left to “sort” in this business was to understand why it was apparently OK to skim off such a healthy fee, more than a quarter, of this largish (5m euro) contract from the Cameroon people? This is basically just theft and I figured there better be a really good reason for it, or I would actually have a problem doing the business. If I am being entirely honest I am not sure exactly what I would have been able to do about it if the fellow insisted on maintaining his arrangements, and I certainly knew you could only ask such a question in a face to face situation and even then only sneak up on it obtusely. However I sure wanted to know why an elder statesman felt he needed to do such a thing and, if it was pure greed, I had it in my mind to convince him to change the balance and reduce his commission to more acceptable levels, which I regard as 5% for services rendered as this represents a fair payment for an agent role, and thus give better value to the people for their tax dollars – so yes, I was hoping to sell more bins!
In the corro below you may well be going "tut tut, obviously it was a scam, that wouldn't have got me" but let me just say you didn't talk to him. I well understand reverse psychology, it is a cool tool, but there are points in this where a scammer should have done slightly different things to what he did do. Except maybe that I appeared to be on the hook so I just needed reeling in. One slightly puzzling aspect to me is that I don't quite see what the real game in town was. I have in the below corro the assurance that all funds required will be paid for by others, except for my own "personal hygiene" costs, ie flights, meals and one night's accommodation.
My wife and business associates take that to mean the only thing that was waiting for me was a kidnapper's holding cell while they attempted to extract a ransom! I don't know, but I hope the following info helps somebody avoid whatever fate was in mind! If you do get here by Google and read this far, please consider contacting the police and reeling the scammer in - I don't know if they are interested / able to do that, but it would at least be worth hearing your account of what happened. It is easy to post things here as a "Guest", they turn up in a day or two, once those kind enough to dedicate their time as moderators here have had a look at them.
Oh and you would have been thinking my first Guest post above should have been enough to tell me it was a scam, but – oh no – the guy went to wind me up again and I just had to try harder to go and check that there hadn’t been some important misunderstanding in there! After all, “Clarity is Power”, and ain’t that the truth – in normal business dealings anyway!!! So, after lots of ado but no more, here is the continuing record of my new but hopefully short life as a scammee:
From: Hon.Simon Achidi Achu hon_achidiachu@live.com
Sent: Wednesday, 25 May, 2011 12:24 AM
Subject: RE: Contract Supply - Hoppers - An Important Problem
Attn; Mr. xxxx,
Am sorry I have not been able to communicate with you for a while now. I was very worried and was thinking of what to do in this present situation.
And I have finally decided to drop these negotiations with you not because of any thing but just because of the fact that I don’t work in doubts. I could still provide you with the entire funds for this contract through my diplomatic contacts here. But I don’t want to start going into certain things and issues and I don’t want to convince you or lure you into this business relationship. I very well understand you position, but there is little or nothing I can do about that as of now because I don’t want to divert my original strategy I mapped out for this contract.
If you are able to come down here, then we can continue from there.
Regards
Honorable
____________________________________________________________
Fine, let’s look for a pragmatic solution:
Dear Honourable Achidi Achu,
If you were to put our company up to do this business of supplying hoppers you would be very happy with the product. They would look good, be in a colour of your choice and have The Party name on them (or whatever you want) to make the Party look good for the October elections - and keep the opposition as the disorganised bunch they are when the government is busy delivering for the people. Plus I had been organising faster delivery so you would have more before the elections.
If you need me to come to Cameroon to facilitate the deal as you want I can do that, and will do a good job of impressing people with my long time interest in Cameroon and ability to perform well on government contracts. All you need to do for your part of the bargain (and your increased commission) is to pay for me to attend Cameroon, and any costs to establish my company as a registered Cameroon supplier. You would be getting a very good return on your investment! Easy to do, and removes all doubts as if they were never there. Your original strategy remains perfectly in place.
On the phone you sounded to me like an intelligent and capable man, and very comfortable in doing your business. There is no need to be worried, just tell me the truth and we will soon find a way to make it work well and safely for both of us. If you want to talk about it more please ring me, use xxx, it is a better quality line and I have arranged this phone number to “follow me” wherever I go, most of the time anyway - you need to do that in the project business! Last time you rang it was 1am here, which was also an issue on top of the weather! If you could ring an hour or more earlier would be helpful if we are to have a good conversation, should you be interested in doing the business….?
____________________________________________________________
From: Hon.Simon Achidi Achu hon_achidiachu@live.com
Sent: Wednesday, 25 May, 2011 10:11 PM
Subject: RE: Contract Supply - Hoppers - A Solution
Attn; Mr. xxxx,
I want you to understand that fraudulent activities take place very day and every where and I have almost been a victim at one time but that does not stop us from carrying out business deals. So we don't have to get stocked at a certain point just because we have found out that businesses like this are some times fraudulent. What about those that are not. When I am stocked some where by my feelings, I always tell my self every thing is worth trying and not until is is tried, it cannot be proven. Like I said last time, I don't want to convince you into working in this business with me.
Due to some reasons, we the top government officials have been restricted from doing any monetary transactions abroad whether receiving or sending money since the formation of the anti embezzlement commission and the anti embezzlement campaign which is currently going on here monitoring us. This makes it impossible for me to send you any money for what so ever reason. The only way I can get money to reach you over there is through diplomatic means and this would be a whole transaction of its own because I can not send you just 5000euros through diplomatic arrangements. With this means, I cannot send less than 1.million euros and above. But we have no business here about me sending you such an amount of money except for the bank attestation for the contract which we expect to do it rather here in Cameroon.
But if you come down here and meet me, then I will give you all the necessary finances you would need for the registration of your company even though from my findings, it does not cost any thing getting your company registered here. The only thing that really requires money is the bank attestation which I am going to provide as I said originally because that would be refunded back ones the contract is awarded you.
Due to the limited time we have at hand, I would not like us to waste any more time here. I do appreciate the full interest you have shown towards working with me in this contract project and securing my total interest in this business. But I would not like to waste any more time here because my committee would be expecting me to come up with the company I want the contract awarded to, in less than a week's time and I would not like this opportunity to slip off my hands and make me loose all I have invested in this contract to have this position that I have in this contract.
So let me know ones again if you are able to come here within a week's time. When you are here, I will take care of every thing directly with you. But if not then I would have to open new negotiations on this matter.
Another option is for you to look for a reliable local attorney here to get your company registered here as required. When the company has been registered, the attorney gets a bank account opened for the registered company from any local first class bank here. In that case, I would have absolutely nothing to do with that. I would only be there to direct you and I would only come in when the company is ready and the bank account ready. Then you come down and I provide you with the bank attestation money to put into the bank account and the bank issue you the bank attestation which you would attach to your bid when bidding for the contract.
Get back to me in time.
Regards
Honorable
____________________________________________________________
I went stuffit, I need to ring this bloke again, so I prepared some questions and did, I was very impressed by the way he handled himself. So I sent this:
Dear Honorable Mr Achidi Achu,
I have put in a tentative booking for flights that would have me arrive in Douala DLA 09:55AM Monday 30/05/2011 and depart Douala midday Saturday 4/06/2011.
I am assuming this will be ample time to sort out the relevant administrative matters plus see some of the sights of Cameroon and get a better understanding of your country.
I will make these arrangements firm tomorrow, unless you have any other suggestions. Regarding accommodation should I simply arrange that on arrival or is there somewhere you would recommend I book into?
I would like to reiterate my apology for doubting you, I had been misled by advice I received. Your latest email caused me to conduct my own research, and I now appreciate your good standing and stature in the community. I am sorry to have risked offending you, and thankful that you are a man of the world and have the wisdom to understand it for what it is! I am now confident this business will go well, and I look forward to meeting you in the coming week.
____________________________________________________________
From: Hon.Simon Achidi Achu hon_achidiachu@live.com
Sent: Thursday, 26 May, 2011 5:51 AM
To: *************************
Subject: RE: Contract Supply - Hoppers, preliminary transport arrgts
Attn; Mr. xxxx,
Thank you for your email.
I can understand your position very well. I am not offended at all by the misinterpretations that you might have had about me and so on. This is normal and every one in your position should have felt the same. Am just happy that at least you have come to know things for your self.
Regarding your time schedule for staying in Cameroon, it would not be enough for us to conclude these arrangements within just one week.
Firstly, just getting your company registered would take us at least one week and then making the arrangements for opening the bank account and obtaining the bank attestation would take us another one whole week. This means that just to get the company file ready for the bidding process for the contract would take at least two weeks.
Then when the company file is ready and we release the tenders for the contract and you submit your bid, it would take another one week for us to award the contract to your company and we do the official signing of the contract and the contract payment which is another one week.
This is just a summary of how this program looks like.
So if you are coming down here, you would have to prepare to be here for at least three weeks or one month, which would enable us to get the company arrangements done within the first two weeks and the third week you do the bidding for the contract. Then another one week to enable us carry out the award of the contract and the official signing of the contract before your return, that would be better, so that you only return to commence with the contract production.
Recheck your schedule and let me know the possibilities of your staying here for at least three weeks to one month because it would not be advisable for you to come down here and go back before coming down again.
As for your stay here, I am going to take care of that. You have to lodge in Douala for one day before we move over to Bamenda since you would definitely be tired upon your arrival in Douala and cannot just leave the Air plane into the car for Bamenda which is about 6 hours drive from Douala. I will get a reservation for you with Akwa Palace Hotel in Douala.
Just recheck your schedule and let me know your program in we can meet up with this complete arrangements upon your coming down here.
Get back to me in time.
Regards
Honorable
____________________________________________________________
OK, so to me this all seemed basically fine. But I soon decided I needed just the one little thing, independent confirmation that I was indeed dealing with the person they said they were. The fraudwatchers moderators had kindly PM’d me more details of similar scams, plus made suggestions of how to convince myself – they didn’t need convincing, beyond about 99-1 certainty against anyway! This lead to me ringing the Canadian Trade Commissioner in the capitol. Because I wasn’t getting anywhere quick with them I sent the below stalling message, after all at this point I had 14 hours left to either start pushing “go” buttons and meet my timetable, or pull the pin. I am not a fan of dragging things out, I want well founded clarity of direction, and action!
I understand your request for me to stay for a month to ensure this business is done properly, it seems entirely sensible now that you explain it like this.
I am discovering getting to Cameroon is not quite as simple as I had expected it to be, plus I need to deal with the logistics of a longer stay than I was originally anticipating. Before a visa can be issued I need to get a yellow fever vaccination, the local clinics that do this are booked out well in advance as a lot of people are using the high $AUD as an excuse to visit Africa, but I will surely find somewhere that can do this on short notice. Then I need to travel to Sydney (200km) for a visa from the Cameroon Consulate, or wait a week for it in the post which wouldn’t be helpful. Plus airline flight availability is a bit of a hit and miss affair as they can’t guarantee anything until I can, which I can’t until I know when the visa is coming, bit of a Catch 22 situation – so I can not yet be certain of my arrival date.
However, whilst I am trying to sort the mechanics of the trip, I have made progress in other areas. The consulate advises me to appoint lawyers Etah-Nan & Co as my legal representatives for their fast high quality service, should I need them for anything. Also I have a Citibank account that Citibank assures me can be used at the Cameroon Douala Branch, which I presume is what you referred to as a first class Cameroon Financial Institution. This is in my personal name as a director of the company, but they also assure me I could open an account quickly from here in the company name if that is a requirement for the attestation process, and it also could be transacted in Cameroon. Please let me know if these arrangements will be suitable, and I will inform you further about arrival details as soon as I can confirm them.
____________________________________________________________
Hmm, then the Canadian Trade Commissioner basically welshed on their promise (if I can believe my ears) for no apparent reason I ever understood. So I figured the guy who had said the things he had said above could stand a little push, so I sent him this - knowing I was losing my ability to get him apprehended at the airport, if that was ever even possible:
I am going to be completely honest with you, I know you are a busy man but I need to ask you to do one small thing for me please. If you can do this then I will find a way to melt away all problems and turn up there on Monday or Tuesday to stay for a month. Whilst I am very happy with our recent conversation and communication, prudence requires that I get independent verification that I am indeed liaising with your good self before I commit the time and money that will be required to do this business. I have come up with a plan to do this diplomatically, ie without exposing you to any risk of allegations about improper conduct.
I have asked the Canadian High Commission in Yaounde to contact you through official channels and ask if you have been approached by me to supply Cameroon with refuse hoppers. Unfortunately they didn’t know how to contact you officially and said that if you came in they would be happy to verify your identity, but otherwise there wasn’t much they could do. So I am asking you to kindly contact either of the following people and tell them that you know of me and satisfy them that you are you, so to speak.
http://www.tradecommissioner.gc.ca/eng/contact-our-team.jsp?oid=149&cid=442Tel.: +237 22 23 23 11
Mr. Eric Dibeu
Senior Trade Commissioner
Mr. Jude Bijingsi
Trade Commissioner
Mr Jude Bijingsi who I spoke to said he knows you well so I am presuming this shouldn’t be too hard, is this OK? The following is how I explained our relationship so that no questions come your way, I wrote this after we spoke. When we spoke I thought he said he knew how to contact you and I should send him an email that he would forward to your official email government address and or would ring you. But he sent me an email back and seemed to be having some difficulty believing you would ever get involved in commercial matters at all and he started asking to see preliminary contracts so they could check it out from that angle so I sent him a second email to clarify it more. His response was that it turned out he didn’t have either your official email address or phone number, so now I am asking you to contact them and tie up this one loose end for me. Thank you, here are the emails:
First email, I thought he would forward this to you:
Thank you very much for taking the time to talk to me today. As discussed I was approached by a person claiming to represent the Honorable Simon Achidi Achu, and encouraging my company to come to Cameroon with a view to entering into a contract to supply 3000 steel refuse hoppers. Apparently this is a contract that the government wants to award soon and to be a public show of action that the CPDM Party are doing good practical things for the people of Cameroon, as part of their strategy to ensure they are returned at the upcoming elections in October.
Apparently it is not easy to find companies that have the capacity to quickly fulfil a large order for this sort of equipment as does my company, and thus Mr Achidi Achu took a personal interest to ensure the contract didn’t “stuff up”. I see he was involved in the strategy for the last presidential elections so this seemed reasonable to me. I have spoken to somebody who claimed to be Mr Achidi Achu, he said very sensible statesman like things, he certainly appeared to be fairly elderly, and he spoke English exceptionally well. I was most impressed!
I must admit the idea of doing business in Cameroon is quite appealing to me, and this seemed to be a reasonable opportunity. So I agreed to come to Cameroon on Monday (flying out Sunday my time) and arrange the necessary steps to qualify for the upcoming tender process, which of course I would do entirely independently.
However my conversation was on a mobile phone, so my purpose in contacting you today was to find a way to contact Mr Achidi Achu directly, with no more complicated a question than “Do you know my name?”. If the answer is yes, no problem and I will complete my arrangements (which I have to do within approximately 14 hours physically from this moment). If the answer is no then the follow-up q is whether he has any interest in my assisting their police to apprehend the criminal impersonating him, which I would expect to be done at Douala airport on my (non-) arrival, and I could “delay” if arrangements required.
I understand from our conversation that you will either ask Mr Achidi Achu my question on my behalf, or forward this message to him for his response. I thank you for your assistance in this important matter and hope to do business in Cameroon in the not too distant future, whether it is this opportunity or some other one.
Second email:
To confirm, all I am actually asking for is if you could kindly use your knowledge of the country to help me find a phone number that I could contact the Honourable Achidi Achu through official channels. I understand he is busy working in The Council of The Wise, which is intended to formulate strategy and tactics to defeat the dominant Social Democratic Front opposition party that traditionally dominates the North West Province, but I cannot find a phone number for it. I could just start ringing government numbers until I found a way to do this verification but that could take a long time for an outsider to do.
I do not have a working contract, nor expect to see one for a couple of weeks. I have provided details of the products we would offer, but do you want to get into that sort of detail to decide to assist me or not? In order to formally tender I do need to be ready and qualified to, which involves formal registration in Cameroon under the OHADA uniform act and arranging for a bank attestation. Please remember that the only reason (I am told) the Honourable Achidi Achu stuck his nose into this matter at all is he wants to be certain of a good result for his election strategy. He is a man of the world and well aware of the scepticism that capable suppliers might have about doing business, but this guy apparently wants 3000 1.2m3 steel rubbish hoppers to be coming soon, and he wants to see as many of them as possible on the ground in Cameroon improving the party’s prospects in the election in only 5 months, so he knows getting tenders from competent suppliers is very important.
All this seems totally believable to me, but I simply want some independent way to verify that the man I was speaking to really was the man he said he was. Just because he spoke and sounded like a high ranking diplomat to me was very good however, whilst I have little knowledge of the skills of scammers, I am not going to strongly challenge such a senior and respected person to prove himself to me. I just seek a simple, easy and polite way to get this verification before I put real money and more time into it.
If I was indeed speaking to the Honourable Achidi Achu and you, I or anyone asks him if he is aware of a Mr xxxx from Australia that wants to tender for an upcoming tender for refuse hoppers he will just give a knowing smile, chuckle and say yes. Mind you he did explain that embezzlement is a big issue in Cameroon and that, whilst he may have encouraged me to do business in Cameroon to ensure he has someone capable of doing the job tendering, it is vital that the tender process be properly independent. So maybe the best q is simply “Are you thinking of releasing a tender for hoppers soon as part of the election strategy?”
This is a senior elderly well respected member of the community and right now he will be pretty busy with election stuff. I am not going to tell him to jump through hoops and go to Yaounde! All I want is some form of independent verification before committing the time and money necessary to do a good job for Cameroon, will you help me please? Thank you.
What say you my friend, can you help me and tidy up this one matter into a good place? Thank you again.
____________________________________________________________
Well I guess that was a bit of an “over the top” kinda push, the scammer panicked and ran as fast as he could in the other direction, sending me the below email as he slammed the door shut. Phew, its over and I know for certain, all I need to do now is to go round and politely let down all those down the line that were expecting a decent order to come their way in the not too distant future (this is done now, they were all very good about it). I have an idea to send this scammer a complimentary note for his excellent scamming, something he can brag to his friends about and see what his ego sprouts back. It seems “tricking people” into “gotcha” situations is an endeavour that the Cameroonian culture includes a large body within it that treats this as a matter of great pride. Shame huh for humankind, but how it is. Here is the sound of the door slamming on me, and undoubtedly opening on another, stay tuned for the next (if any) chapter:
From: Hon.Simon Achidi Achu hon_achidiachu@live.com
Sent: Friday, 27 May, 2011 3:41 AM
To: ************************
Subject: RE: Contract Supply - Hoppers, preliminary transport arrgts
Attn; xxxx,
I am really surprise you would go to such extends trying to sabotage me unknowingly. I realize that these whole arrangements can cost me more than I expect. So I will not like to continue with this business with you.
There is one thing I want you to understand, no body would ever like to identify his or her self in this type of matters concerning me and my party because they know the implications and what can happen. That is why those you have spoken to after a second thought seem not to want to make any further steps. You don’t know about our style of politics here and so should not think that you can just get in and have what you want just like that. With the style of politics we operate here, you watch your back as you take a step forward. I have been informed on a private line about his finding you tried to do. I want you to understand that this contract business is more political than you think and I believe I told you that and as such aught to be kept very confidential. But am embarrassed you are exposing it there by trying to weaken the strings we have pulled from this end of our campaign movement.
I do appreciate your kind intentions and assume all you are trying to do is to protect your self from pilferers. Never the less, I will not like that we continue this business any further because it would definitely not go the way I anticipated.
More over you are not able to come down here soonest as thought and you cannot pick any one in the name of a lawyer to work with my party in this business when we know the intentions and the value of the business to our party at this moment in time.
I guess we would have something to do in the future but certainly not now.
My kind regards
Honorable
